Blog post by Jennifer Henderson, Keeper of the Registers of Scotland.

Earlier this year I shared information about our registration arrear and measures we’ve put in place to help stabilise and eradicate it within the next 12 months. During this period in order to provide additional support to our customers for urgent cases, I introduced an expedite process and committed to not reject applications (unless legally impossible to register) that have been with Registers of Scotland for longer than 90 days.

In August this year, I contacted the CEOs of the main banks and building societies active in the Scottish conveyancing market. This was to highlight and apologise for our arrear and provide assurance of our commitment to clearing it. I also wanted to invite them to help us remove the pain points that result in a high number of requests for updates on the progress of applications. This is at a cost to lenders, solicitors and to my organisation.

I am pleased to share with you that we had an excellent response from the lending community – with one CEO replying in under 9 minutes!

I set up a special engagement team who have been meeting with key representatives from the lending community, including lenders and lender management companies. We have been able to explain the registration process in Scotland and the extremely low level of risks associated with continuing to transact on properties undergoing registration.

We are confident we can start to close off the need for the ‘chase loop’ between the lender, panel management company, panel solicitors and RoS. As a result of feedback from these meetings, we will shortly begin a pilot where we provide tailored data reports to lenders to help answer the question of where their cases are against our service level agreements and arrear targets.

The key to all of this is working more closely in partnership with our stakeholders and customers and I am grateful to all for the benefits this closer working is already delivering.

We are pleased to support the proactive work RoS is doing to engage with lenders and believe this is a positive step towards helping our members reduce onerous chase enquiries and maintain strong working relationships with the lending community. – Gillian Alexander, Head of Professional Practice, Law Society of Scotland.

I will continue to update you regularly on progress, and you can read more about our current position on our website, which is updated on a monthly basis. If you have any questions, please contact Diane Waugh, customer relationship manager ( CRTeam@ros.gov.uk ).

Stay in the loop

Don’t miss the latest news, service updates and blog posts! Follow us on Twitter and on Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram for more updates.